


The Bosmer Who Never Smiled

by Nebulad



Series: Cannibal Witch of the Wilds [2]
Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: 3dnpc - Freeform, F/M, Fluff, Other, misc adventuring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-05-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 16:18:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10994502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nebulad/pseuds/Nebulad
Summary: And finally the third was that she didn’t seem to have much of a sense of humor. It wasn’t that she was sharp, or dour, particularly serious. Jokes simply flew over her head like a bird flown too low, and that was that; if she found him funny she gave literally zero outward indications of such, and frequently responded to hishilariousquips about the various beasts and citizens they passed with a queer look like she wasn’t quite sure she’d heard him right.





	1. Flat Smile

There were three notable things about Rumarin’s new companion, the first of which was that she let him tag along and so the other two didn’t _quite_ matter as much. Far be it from him to start being truly discerning about the company he kept; his only real standard was _are they alive_ and Tsabhira fit that bill just fine, strange name and all.

The second, probably _least_ important thing was that after they managed to make their way far enough south that the trees had leaves again, she pulled off her hood and face cover and was actually fairly good looking. Certainly she was the prettiest elf he’d seen since getting to Skyrim, which actually wasn’t saying very much since her competition was himself, Ulundil, and Arivanya, and could they even be compared if she wasn’t even the same sort of elf? They were all fairly standard Altmer anyway, which Rumarin felt comfortable saying even having only really been exposed to passing Thalmor, his parents, and the aforementioned Horsemaster and Mrs. Horsemaster. Now Nords— he could, with confidence, say she was prettier than the Nords he’d come across.

And finally the third was that she didn’t seem to have much of a sense of humor. It wasn’t that she was sharp, or dour, particularly serious. Jokes simply flew over her head like a bird flown too low, and that was that; if she found him funny she gave literally zero outward indications of such, and frequently responded to his _hilarious_ quips about the various beasts and citizens they passed with a queer look like she wasn’t quite sure she’d heard him right.

He decided that maybe she didn’t speak Common very well. He didn’t know much about her, and while she seemed to dress normally and otherwise act in an entirely predictable manner (as far as strange adventurers went, it wasn’t as if she was gorging herself on cheese or standing quietly and staring out at the horizon for hours at a time), it was entirely possible that Skyrim was just a foreign and frankly unpleasant place that she’d happened to find herself in.

Keeping things casual, he waited until they’d settled in for the evening. She wasn’t nocturnal so he ruled out _vampire_ as she turned the meat she was cooking (hopefully for both of them). He’d been warned early on that vegetables would be his problem if he wanted any; her following the Green Pact seemed to underline the whole _probable foreigner_ thing.

“So… Tsabhira…”

“Tsabhi is fine,” she answered. See, there was the crux of the matter; she didn’t _sound_ as if she were new to the Common, and while he realised that his opinion of her accent meant less than nothing, he was running out of ideas.

He leaned back, faux casual and wondering if she’d notice his enormous effort to be silly. She didn’t, her eyes glued to the food. “Sounds like a Khajiit name.” It was about the dumbest thing he could possibly say, but he did it anyway because it sounded less blunt than _where were you born._

“A Khajiit adopted me when I was little,” she offered without looking up.

“In Elsweyr?”

“Cyrodiil.” She didn’t continue which left Rumarin in a strange limbo of not knowing whether or not she was annoyed at his asking. To be fair to him, he’d warned her when she found him at Yorgrim’s Overlook that he was generally insufferable and so she shouldn’t have been all that surprised.

“Whereabouts?”

“All over. It was a caravan, but only one Khajiit.” She spared him a brief glance, as if to gauge how he was going to react. Caravans had a much rougher time in Skyrim than they did anywhere else, which was impressive considering that nearly everyone in Tamriel seemed to agree that Khajiit were an omen of impending wrongdoing.

He attempted to put her at ease by avoiding the obvious commentary on how difficult it must’ve been. “Strange we never met, then. I travelled with a group of actors.” That was simplifying it all a little bit, but she probably wasn’t all that interested in his childhood.

“Not so strange. It’s a large province…” she trailed off, but he could feel her watching him. “Actors?” They really had been a difficult group to miss: three Altmer with fairly healthy senses of humour, an overtly drunk Nord, and a motley collection of other bizarre characters that came and went like the moons.

“It might be a little generous to some of us. I wouldn’t cast me in anything that required actual talent, but if you need someone to pretend there’s an insect in his soup to get it for free from the inn, I’m your elf.” She didn’t laugh, but shifted over a little closer to him. She had the food off the fire now, offering him a portion. Laziness won out over a balanced diet and he forgot his urge to cook vegetables for himself. Scurvy it was, then. “What about your group? You said they weren’t all Khajiit.”

“Three Bosmer, an Imperial, a Dunmer, an Orc, the leader was Khajiit,” she explained. “We weren’t very interesting. We just took orders and moved product across the province.”

“When did you strike out on your own?”

She frowned and evidently he’d asked the wrong question; the only option, however, was to own it since he couldn’t very well _un-say_ it and didn’t think she’d appreciate if he fumbled over himself. “I… didn’t. We were ambushed by the Imperial army at Bruma and I took off when Dro’Baad gave the _scatter_ order.”

“Ambushed for _what?”_

“War crimes: smuggling, treason, possession with the intent to sell, using offensive magic against Imperial soldiers, resisting arrest, murder of Imperial soldiers, reckless endangerment of civilians, and possession of forbidden religious paraphernalia… those are the only ones he managed to say before me and Han-Ilu taught him what _offensive magic_ really meant.”

He stared at her, agape, but once again she failed to indicate that she was joking, or that there was a joke, or that he should be finding anything funny about this situation. “And that wasn’t considered interesting?” he asked, though strictly speaking he wouldn’t have said _interesting._ Apparently he was travelling with one of Tamriel’s most wanted— or perhaps she had a free pass in Skyrim. Who cared what upset the Imperials in the south; even the most devote wouldn’t bother her, even if they’d known.

“We didn’t fight very long. We weren’t an army, and Dro’Baad knew we were beat if we stood our ground. He gave the scatter order after… after Gaeleg died.” Something raw passed over her before she banished it to wherever her sense of humour was hiding. “I don’t know what happened to the others.”

“So you just ran until it got cold?” he asked. He mentally added a fourth fact to his meagre list of notable things about Tsabhi: if they ever came across a bard, they’d never be able to shake the fool off, like a persistent, hump-happy dog. Tsabhi _oozed_ stories.

“Yes. I ran all the way to Darkwater Crossing but turns out the Imperials were waiting in ambush.”

“For you?” She gave him that look again, the one that served as a substitute for laughter.

“No, for Ulfric Stormcloak. They recognised me though, so I was thrown into the wagon beside the Nords.” She paused, taking a bite of her food and chewing thoughtfully. “I didn’t even know what a Stormcloak was. I left with Ralof— a lieutenant— and Ulfric, and abandoned them around Riverwood once they explained to me what they’d been arrested for. They wanted me to join,” she said, scowling.

“I guess that answers the question of whether or not the Nords actually know what an elf is,” he said, leaning back. She was a passable cook, although frankly his tastes ran a bit richer than _a large chunk of adequately charred meat._ “I mean sure, blame them for the imagined dissolution of your culture; but can you identify one on sight?”

To his infinite surprise, that drew a flat smile. It was… more unnerving than he’d expected, honestly, but he counted it as a victory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [My writing blog is here](http://nebulaad.tumblr.com) and frankly if I was going to do some fairytale AU, Tsabhira would definitely be the princess who never smiled. Only it's cooler when you say "the dragon who never smiled" except at no point in this fic is she the actual dragonborn. Tsabhi actually ollies the fuck out of Helgen and takes care of a lot of business before she finds out she's the dragonborn.
> 
> Also highkey, I wanted to end this with something more explicitly shippy or romantic but nothing was really clicking properly. idk yet if it's just my pre-humiliation about the thought of the mod author being technically able to find this at any time and judge me, or if their relationship is just. very complicated.


	2. Partners Part One: Depressing Stone Cages

Brynjolf was _smooth._ Hell, when he called Tsabhi _lass,_ even Rumarin’s knees buckled a little bit; but of course, she seemed entirely… devoid of reaction. She didn’t find his low, mead-y voice offensive nor appealing, but the moment he mentioned coin? Her head turned low, her chin touching her shoulder and her eyes slowly crawling from the Nord’s chest to his face.

“We’ll think about it,” she said, just about the only indication that she was at all interested in anything Brynjolf had said up until this point.

“Think _fast_ , lass,” he warned.

“Why, are you going to throw something at me?” With that she turned back to Rumarin and gestured him away, ducking through the crowd in the inn and taking the stairs down to Elgrim’s Elixirs. She didn’t go in, but took a seat on the staircase just across the way and pulled a green apple out of her bag. It was a strange contradiction: she’d eat nothing that had to grow to be made, but had an exception for specifically green apples. He’d never asked, as it was best not to annoy the elf who, on occasion, ate flesh. “What do you think?” she asked him as he settled down next to her.

“Oh you know me: nothing.”

“Rumarin.”

“What? I’m hardly an expert on stealing. All I know is that as far as Nords go, Brynjolf isn’t the most unpleasant one I’ve ever met and I have _no_ doubt that you could steal circles around all of them. Remember Balgruuf’s palace?” No one had even seen them duck into the back, nor leave with pretty much everything valuable that wasn’t nailed down. _Everyone’s got to eat somehow, Rumarin,_ she’d said, handing him most of their stolen goods.

“Not sure I want to do it in a guild setting though. Especially a _failing_ guild.”

“On the bright side, they’d probably put you in charge within three days; then again, they’re _clearly_ daft. Did you see what Brynjolf was wearing?” He shook his head and was rewarded with one of the cool, flat smiles that Tsabhi had started giving him on a much more frequent basis. It was probably a good thing, overall, and who knew? Maybe one day he’d get a full blown laugh, which for her would probably be a sharp exhale at the same time as the smile.

She looked over at the alchemy shop, humming thoughtfully. She wasn’t allowed inside; it was his rule. They didn’t have the money to support her alchemy habit, unless she was finding ingredients in the wild and making her own potions. Between that and stealing, he was living comfortably as she didn’t seem to object to paying for him. “Do you think Brynjolf is the boss?” she asked.

“Who else?” The only other person they’d seen that could pass as a guild member was the Sapphire woman who’d cheated the stableboy. It was plausible, he supposed; she ran scams same as Brynjolf, but with an attitude. Still, she had very little contact with… anyone. She mostly hung around the Bee and Barb looking a cross between bored and annoyed.

“They must have a hideout. Maybe we could find it?” His nose wrinkled and she gave him a look.

“Didn’t the guard say something about the sewers?” Call him delicate, but sewer-stomping was very low on his list of things he wanted to do in Riften. Honestly if they left the city right that second, he wouldn’t have been upset; the lot of it smelled like a sewer and he’d been compulsively checking his bag since they arrived.

She shrugged but dropped the topic, finishing up her apple and tossing the core into the waterway where a smallish slaughterfish tore it to pieces and then sunk back down into the dirt. _Note to self: don’t fall in._ “I’m getting sick of Riften,” she admitted, and her voice alerted him to the fact that he’d leaned over closer to her to watch the fish tear the apple up. He decided to just go with it, resting his chin on her shoulder. She allowed it, giving him the same over the shoulder look she’d given Brynjolf. “Any suggestions?”

“For what?”

“Leaving. Where do you want to go?” Honestly, he was content to wander. Being in towns meant that he had to behave himself like a real person: out in the world he could only annoy Tsabhi, which he was oddly bad at doing. She tolerated him better than his own mother had, although to be fair she hadn’t been present for half his embarrassing phases.

She was looking for an answer, and so he gave the first one that came to mind. “Ever been to Solitude? The drinks are vile but the Nords say it’s as good as being in Imperial City.”

“Is it?” She wasn’t shrugging him off so he only hoped that he wasn’t starting to make a strange face.

“Oh gods no. It’s a depressing stone cage like every other Nord city, but the shopping’s all right.” He left it up to her whether or not he meant stealing, because quite frankly, that too. She didn’t end up asking, anyway, but paid the driver for both of their fares when they left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still going, six chapters are all done, just shuffling my ass along.


	3. Smug Smile

He honestly wasn’t that interested in alchemy in and of itself. It was a messy art that frequently smelled medicinal enough to make his stomach churn, not to mention the ever-present threat of explosion, poison, or burning of the eyes and lungs. He’d never picked up a mortar and pestle in his life after watching a man in Cheydinhal burn off the skin of three of his fingers, shrieking as the bone revealed itself to open air.

Tsabhira, of course, seemed much more competent than the random fool Breton who’d hurt himself. She certainly made mistakes, but they were mild in nature; the worst one in his memory simply made the air smell bad, but as they’d been on a windy glacier in Winterhold it’d hardly mattered for more than a few minutes.

It was actually fairly interesting to watch her, in the sense that it ranked above sitting around being hungry and looking longingly at the fire that was tragically lacking any actual cooking apparatus. She would occasionally even pop something gross in her mouth and wince when it burned; oddly enough, her exception for consuming plant life extended to potions and their ingredients. Personally, he might’ve recommended trying the wonderful things _bread_ had to offer before gnawing on raw wheat, but what did he know?

Certainly not how to mix two weird and unpleasant looking roots and end up with some silvery-blue liquid that replenished magicka. She added moon sugar to that one, when they happened upon some; not enough to modify the effect of the potion, but for taste. _I’m chugging so many of these stupid things that I may as well._

_Can you make mine taste like asparagus grilled with a wedge of lemon? Seasoned to taste, of course._

_Can you season a vegetable to taste like meat?_

_Forgot who I was talking to._

They were at an inn so technically he was able to approach the bar for food; maybe Tsabhi was ruining his very sensitive palette with her nightly medium-rare barbeques. The thought of eating the slop that the innkeeper would no doubt throw together in some sort of wooden bucket made him vaguely ill, so he decided to wait. He’d coaxed the elf into at least buying _him_ vegetables, so it’d be a slippery slope into cooking them for him as well.

“Taste this,” she said suddenly, shoving the mortar into his hands. There was a particularly pulpy red substance that seemed inconsistent in texture and overall… liquid/solid dynamic. On the bright side it smelled like a berry blend his mother used to buy for him in Leyawiin, when they dropped in.

“This won’t turn me into a toad, will it?” he asked.

“No, but I will if you don’t get on with it.” She was sitting close enough to follow through on that promise, so he tilted the bowl back into his mouth before he could think better of it. It tasted… very good, actually. It was sweet and sour, with a smoother note that nearly made up for the poor blending job she’d done. “Well?” she asked impatiently.

“It tastes like dessert. What does it do?” he asked, and so his infinite surprise he was introduced to a different sort of smile. While it was enormously smug for reasons he couldn’t entirely understand, it was much more satisfying than her flat… well, could it even be called a smile anymore? Now that he knew her face was indeed capable of _multiple_ expressions, he would have to think of a new name for the not-grimace she’d _been_ giving him.

“It’s not a potion,” she corrected him. “You just had that look on your face that usually goes away if I hand you food, and I had berries left over.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Is there actually a _point_ to this fic, what does this illustrate?" Literally nothing. It's cute though, right? Cute-ish?


	4. Partners Part 2: Apricots

Rumarin was not a caretaker; what he _was_ was an only child who’d been raised communally by multiple people and given all but their full attention. Certainly he was used to not being priority _one,_ but by and large the only person he had to fail to keep healthy was himself. Even that had gotten better since leaving Eastmarch (or had he been closer to Winterhold?) with Tsabhi, because now his injuries were tended to by someone who could use magic and make potions rather than tie the least filthy rag on hand off on it and hope for the best.

Honestly, he hadn’t even thought she was capable of poor health. Didn’t Bosmer have some sort of resistance to your everyday germ? They lived outside, historically, so weren’t all these wretched elements supposed to be her friend? Supposition made no difference in the end, of course; not to mention, she was bitten by a skeever. That was all that did it, one of those cowardly little rats taking a bite out of her ankle. Just like that, she had the Rattles.

And of course this wasn’t as simple as your everyday cold; of course it wasn’t, because the first time Rumarin had to take charge of another person _had_ to be in a fairly urgent situation. She was in no state to even instruct him on how to make a potion to cure her even if he was inclined to take the risk of poisoning her with his subpar alchemy skills, and of course the nearest alchemist had only just sold out of the very specific, expensive potion she needed.

“Stop panicking,” she said from their rented bed; the large one that’d cost extra because she was sick and so they had to cover the cost of the no doubt inadequate sanitation job the inn would run when they left. He didn’t know why; Rattles wasn’t contagious unless she bit someone.

“I’m not panicking. I’m perfectly calm about this situation; you’re going to get worse before we have the opportunity to make you better, and even then we might not be able to do that depending entirely on the whims of the hack alchemists dotting Skyrim’s landscape.” As far as ideal situations went, this ranked right around _dragons returning in the middle of a civil war._

“ _Worse_ doesn’t mean anything. I’m just going to be uncomfortable.” Sure, she _said_ that, but her voice was hoarse and her skin had lost the healthy flush that he associated with living creatures. She was multiple shades of brown-grey, had chills and sweat in a cycle, and alternated between restless pacing and zero movement whatsoever.

“Isn’t there that alchemist in Windhelm? The one who’s fairly diseased himself?” he asked. It was Windhelm, which was a distinct downside, but optimistically speaking he seemed like their best bet.

“A disease he doesn’t manage well, if I recall,” she said flatly.

“Sure, but yours is much less serious than his; surely he’ll be able to whip up some common cure for Rattles?” It made sense to him, but she was giving him a look that he wasn’t sure how to read. On one hand, it might’ve been expressing how unimpressed she was by the suggestion, but on the other she may have just been nodding off while he spoke.

“I’d rather have Rattles than go to Windhelm,” she said, which didn’t bode well for his one and only plan. “Take me to Markarth. The alchemist there likes me, and its closer than Windhelm.” And there she was, thinking of everything even while being the least capable of the two.

He helped her to the carriage although gods forbid anyone see her actually needing help to support her own weight. She even climbed up by herself, further cementing his absolute uselessness. “I hate this province,” she snapped as the horses jerked into movement and nearly sent her sprawling. She didn’t elaborate further, but based on the way she was curled up into a ball as if a warmth slouch had ever done anything for anyone in the province that the Divines had forgotten, she was cold.

He slid off of his seat and onto the bottom of the carriage, taking a spare cloak (still stained with blood and most definitely having belonged to a bandit) out of his pack and patting the spot next to him. She waffled about it for a moment, but cold won out over dignity and she got down, taking the cloak and wrapping it around herself like a blanket (lucky, tiny Bosmer). “So this alchemist,” he began, putting his arm around her casually. She’d be more comfortable if she relaxed a little and certainly the way to do that was to invade her personal space. “I’ve been to Markarth and the only one I ever met was this _terrifying_ Breton woman. I’m pretty sure she predicted how I would die.”

Maybe she was sicker than he thought, because she didn’t rip his arm off. “Choking to death on an apricot kernel,” she guessed, shutting her eyes and making use of his side (not _quite_ proportionate enough to hit his shoulder).

“I know you only said that to scare me, but I hope you know that you and the hag have _ruined_ apricots for me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ["Drive Him Wild With Hints That You Know When He'll Die"](https://www.pinterest.com/pin/295759900515063963/). Tsabhi's pinterest board is so aesthetic although tbh I only barely know how to use pinterest and they change it every few weeks so that probably doesn't link back to it.


	5. Laughter

Gods help him, this was bad. This was… so, so bad. On a scale from _something warm to drink after a long day_ all the way to _having to spend longer than ten minutes in the Palace of Kings,_ this ranked approximately _stuck in an inn and definitely a vampire._

It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t noticed, either! Tsabhi had fixed him with one of her infernal _looks_ when suddenly everything became… very obvious, but how was he to know? They’d gone and cleared out a cave of vampires for Sybille Stentor— who, by the way, was _flagrantly_ a vampire herself— and he’d felt fine afterwards. Rather proud of himself for getting nicked and not asking for healing, all rugged like a real adventurer. The wind had been yanked from his sails, of course, when he woke up and…

“You sound ridiculous, Ru. Why are you talking like that?” She turned from the book she was reading and with good reason. He’d tried to make a joke about bees and barbs as he skimmed over her shoulder, but it’d… come out wrong. Not correctly. Very not right.

“My theeth,” he stammered, his hand flying to his mouth.

“Your eyes,” she said, hers widening in a way that wasn’t doing anything for his pounding heart— nor _her_ pounding heart which was actually _unusually loud._ Why could he hear that? “Rumarin, are you feeling— are you hungry?”

“No. Thud I be?” His tongue was— he was having difficulty making his tongue and teeth work together because suddenly it seemed as if his canines were making a gap he wasn’t used to as he tried to speak. Everything was coming out with a lisp and this was honestly one of the worst nights of his life.

“Ideally not— let’s try to keep it that way for a while, all right?” And that’s when she gave him the _look,_ the _I know you’re upset right now but how the_ hell _did you not notice this?_

The word _vampire_ hadn’t been spoken aloud yet, but even he wasn’t so spectacularly dense as to miss the implications of all this. “I thon’t want to eat a _corpsth,”_ he protested, far too loud considering the precarious nature of their situation. To be fair to him _this was terrible,_ and instead of shrugging it off and banishing his trouble in a bowl of hot soup like _any other illness,_ he was trying to resist thinking about food lest it make him hungry. Worst case scenario wasn’t eating a corpse (although it wasn’t ideal either), it was eating a temporarily alive villager.

She didn’t say anything to that, but got up to go into the main hall of the inn. They’d _been_ locked in their room together for the night, but evidently she was going out to test the waters, see what the situation was going to be like. Unfortunately, panic struck a little; was the room getting a mite cosy? Closing in, much like some sort of coffin made of wood and not pie because vampires had no _interest_ in all the good food that made life worth living? _“Thahbie—”_ he said quickly, scrambling _out_ of bed to catch her. He wasn’t exactly dressed to be in public but it was either that or stop breathing.

Gods, would that even do anything?

It wasn’t until he actually got his arms around her, using her as some sort of prickly Bosmer teddy bear, that he realised she was _laughing._ Pure shock won out over offence for a moment as he pulled back a little to let her cover her mouth with her hand like that would somehow hide it from him. “I’m sorry,” she said, sounding near to tears but _definitely_ laughing. “It’s just— you can’t talk around the teeth.”

“Glad you tink ith’s thunny,” he said, not sure if the emotion he meant to convey was urgency or complete and utter stupefaction. He couldn’t even make a sound judgement on what he thought of her laugh because he was in the middle of a crisis.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, trying to take deep breaths to steady herself. Giggles— actual _giggles—_ wormed their way out of her regardless of what she thought of the matter. “I’ll fix this, Ru, promise.”

“Good,” he said, conscious of the way it still slurred a little at the end. It suddenly seemed weird to be standing there holding her like he was, but on the other hand _most_ embarrassing moment had already been claimed by accidental vampirism so… why not? “Sthill, you thould do the thalking for a while.”

“How will we get by without your charm?” she asked dryly, patting his cheek. A sure loss, to be certain, but he’d already talked himself out. A shame, since their witty banters were so rare due to her weird combination of hidden moods, but she was trying _very hard_ on his behalf to not laugh and doing poorly. The least he could do was help her.

He was sworn to carry her burdens, after all— or be a burden. He couldn’t remember which.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know why but I thought this was fucking hilarious because I mean. Sometimes you don't notice when you're diseased !! Bethesda didn't really incorporate disease super good and while I can say that this hasn't actually happened to me on this scale, it's still hilarious to me that it _might_. If I'm working real hard to _not_ notice and taking into account that most in-game indicators are like.... game mechanics? idk it's a dumb chapter but I thought it was funny.


	6. Partners Part Three: Cursed As A Child

Say what you wanted about the College, but at least they had a very healthy fear of Tsabhira. Maybe fear wasn’t the right word— gods forbid a mage ever have the sense to be rightly frightened of anything, but there was something about the Bosmer that they took note of, despite her status as a lowly Novice. Her magic was far beyond her rank— she grew up breathing her own magicka, after all— but normally he’d say her disregard for College hierarchy and low spot on it would create a problem when it came to sucking up resources.

When she made the treacherous journey across the crumbling bridge while supporting most of Rumarin’s height and weight, however, they made room. When she demanded a constant flow of magicka potions, they obliged. When she very sharply told Colette Marence that if she even _breathed_ in their direction she’d shove a fireball so deep down her throat that her organs would be cooked before her ribcage could be cracked open, the woman shuffled away.

It was all so stupid, really. They were two mages— well, a mage and a jester who only knew one good trick, maybe— trying to take on the world. Tsabhi usually had enough magicka potions on hand to deal with every situation, but they’d been getting ready to stop soon to resupply. They were running low and happened upon a wandering group of bandits; four against two, and not in their favour. It usually didn’t matter, with Tsabhi spitting fire from behind him and Rumarin showing off one of the few useful skills he actually possessed. It was only that… one of them got lucky.

The woman slipped behind Rumarin and headed right for the mage as she tried to chug the last of her magicka potion— one of the weaker ones. The bandit missed, the first time, and Tsabhi darted out of the way and scrambled up a snowbank. Rumarin adjusted his position so he was closer to her— what good was he as the melee portion of their team if he left the ranged fighter behind? It was only that the bastards had split up strategically, so that Rumarin was fighting off a Nord twice his size.

Magic flooded back into Tsabhi but he kept his eye on her. She killed the woman who’d made her way past the front lines, but unfortunately that meant only two of the bandits were dead. The other one, still alive and holding a bow, pulled out broadsword and made their way towards his Bosmer companion. They weren’t tall but they were broad, and had their eyes fixed on Tsabhi who was scrambling through the bandit’s pack— presumably for a potion.

She ducked out of the way of the first swing, kicking up snow in her attempt to escape. She managed to very awkwardly roll back off her vantage point, down back to Rumarin’s level. She wasn’t casting anything, probably trying to build up for something larger, but her escape skills needed serious work. She was running, but trying to stay within range of Rumarin who was also desperately trying to fight off this huge brute of a man. The other bandit was in pursuit, but not particularly worried about losing her— evidently her very obvious hesitance to ditch Rumarin, while heartwarming, was noted.

The turning point was when Rumarin had _just_ managed to fend the Nord off to retreat, and his sword went out. He did carry a dagger for emergencies, but suddenly that seemed incredibly stupid because there was no _way_ he was nimble enough to avoid a battleaxe _and_ get in close enough to stab. He tried to emulate Otero, but in the end he’d never actually been _taught_ to fight (by anyone, let alone his childhood friend). His magicka was gone and so were his potions, and so… like Tsabhi, he darted.

He approached her with the intent to grab her up off the ground and start hauling their pitiful hides to the nearest town to let the guards take care of the remaining two bandits, but the problem— one of the many problems— was that her pursuer had caught up with her. Raising their blade high, they swung it down to strike at the Bosmer who was rolling too slow and in the wrong direction.

Instead of grabbing her, he shoved the bandit to the side. Not hard enough, evidently, because they compensated and swung back around to stab the sword into Rumarin’s side. He wasn’t well practiced in the art of getting injured, but he had to say getting stabbed was worse than the vampire incident. Much worse. His legs stopped working pretty much immediately, followed by his lungs forgetting how exactly the whole _breathing_ thing was supposed to work. He made a noise that wasn’t nearly as rugged or collected or masculine as he wanted it to be, and he was barely aware of Tsabhi summoning a dremora churl (finally having gathered enough magicka to do so) and the beast absolutely _slaughtering_ the bandits.

Things were blurry on the hobble over to The Frozen Hearth, and blurrier while Tsabhi demanded that room be made and that Nelacar bring her potions. She stabilized him in the inn and gave Dagur a truly withering look when he demanded compensation for the mess and the panic. From there they’d moved to the College, into her room. She’d been casting constant Restoration spells since he’d been hurt, and while reality was righting itself under his dizzy gaze, Brelyna, J’zargo, and Onmund were still kind enough to be fetching, making, and stealing magicka potions for her long after the professors lost interest in whether Rumarin lived or died.

Brelyna was asleep in the corner, leaning on J’zargo, with Onmund in his own room using up the last of the stolen elves ear and creep cluster, when Rumarin finally grabbed her wrist. “Not that I’m not grateful, but watching you cast is starting to make _me_ tired,” he mumbled, his voice still thick in his mouth.

“You need a lot of damage repair,” she said stiffly, taking her hand back.

“I’m _still_ in danger?” he asked incredulously. Who knew how much magic went into a simple stab wound— no wonder Nords hated the art so bad. They were arguably the most stab-able race there was, and if they had to waste their whole day on a pitiful mortal wound they’d probably do nothing else. Quicker to just die, really.

“N-no. No.” _That_ was defensive. “It’s just your side will scar if I don’t—”

“I can _live_ with a scar. Gods, you scared me there for a second. I can only pretend to apologise for so many sins before I’m just wasting the gods time.” He sat up and _ow,_ but he followed through with it to demonstrate that she could drop the magic for a few seconds. The wound was much more shallow, now, although as she’d said it was still… present. Not bleeding, though, and while granted he was _not_ a healer, that seemed like a very good thing.

“Look if you just let me _finish—”_

“You _are_ finished, you said so yourself. As nice as it sounds to have my skin remain spotless forever, it’d probably be nicer to keep the person who pays for my food alive.” It didn’t even hurt, in earnest. It hurt so little that he’d normally try to milk it, except if he did then Tsabhira would fall for it with guilt-inducing genuity.

“Can you just not be glib for a _second?”_ she demanded. She actually sounded upset so it would’ve probably been polite to take it seriously.

“No. I was cursed by a witch as a child.”

“You’re about to be cursed by another one,” she groused, slouching back. She wasn’t casting anything, though, so technically he’d won. “I’m sorry,” she added.

“Don’t be. You’re the useful one nine times out of ten; turns out I’m only good as a meat shield, so no need for _you_ to apologise.” It was a conversation he certainly didn’t want to have, because if she thought she didn’t like casual glibness, she would _certainly_ hate purposeful, near maniacal glibness.

“I can’t help it,” she protested, although not very hard. She straightened herself up in her chair, probably because she was allergic to relaxation. “I was cursed by a witch as a child.”

His head snapped up. “Was that a joke?” She smiled, although near-death wasn’t worth a laugh like accidental vampirism. “Oh gods, I am dying aren’t I?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [My writing blog is, once again, here](http://nebulaad.tumblr.com) and this one actually happens a lot. I have picture of the one time I had a wilderness expansion installed, and so we happened upon a herd of like, three sabre cats and some cubs. But I also had (have) One With Nature installed because I don't like killing animals in the game. So while Rumarin was constantly getting his shit wrecked by these sabres, I was farming him for Restoration.


End file.
